Push to force roadhouses to sell Opal fuel

Opal fuel is back in the spotlight with a push to force roadhouses around Central Australia to sell the non-sniffable petrol.

Currently there are 11 roadhouses in the Opal roll out zone that refuse to sell Opal petrol.

Now, a group from Central Australia have flown to Canberra to lobby the Federal Government to intervene and make it law that all roadhouses in petrol sniffing prone areas must sell Opal.

Blaire McFarland from the Central Australian Youth Link Up Service (CAYLUS) says it's unfair that some roadhouse have agreed to sell Opal, while others refuse.

"It's not really fair on the petrol stations that are voluntarily providing Opal if the petrol station next door goes off Opal, they lose customers."

Blaire McFarland says the voluntary nature of the scheme compromises the whole project.

"It just seems slightly ridiculous to have a multi million dollar strategy that rolls out on to the ground only if the people voluntarily decide to go on to it."

Mr McFarland says one of the biggest challenges to the roll out of Opal in roadhouses has been what he calls an urban myth about the fuel.

"Before Opal rolled out there was an urban myth that got around that Opal was bad for cars and there was a lot of media that said, 'Opal ruined my car'. And so a lot of people are really suspicious of Opal."

Despite this, he is confident that the group's concerns will be taken up by Canberra.

"I think that there's every chance that they'll listen to us. The last time a delegation like this went down to Canberra was to ask government to roll out Opal, to make it regionally available.

"They listened and they did it and after that we saw a reduction in sniffing by 90 per cent. I think the odds are very good that they'll listen to us."